There are lots of public policy problems that, even with the best of political goodwill, cannot be easily solved. They’re just inherently tough. Fixing airline overbooking is not one of them.
As proposed by Harvard economist Greg Mankiw on his blog, the solution is straightforward: Make the airlines pay when they overbook. When they do, “they should fully bear the consequences. They should be required (by government regulation) to keep raising the offered compensation until they get volunteers to give up their seats,” writes Mankiw. “If $800 does not work, then try $1,600 or $8,000.”
Mankiw…

Latin America’s most technologically advanced shipping terminal opened early this month with great fanfare. But the ambitious project faces an uncertain future as U.S. President Trump weighs new trade barriers.

Its springtime in Washington. The cherry blossoms have lost their premature bloom, but talk of financial regulatory reform is in full flower. Lets hope that these reform discussions are longer-lived than the cherry blossoms. There is reason to worry, however, that we will not succeed in more than superficially disentangling ourselves from Dodd-Franks seductive embrace.
On the promising side, we are hearing some calls for reform from people who were central in shaping Dodd-Frank implementation. For example, as Federal Reserve Governor Daniel Tarullo packed his bags, he made an…

<p>The spectacular failure of what was once the world’s biggest renewable-energy company has turned into a smorgasbord of wind and solar farms being gobbled up by infrastructure investors, clean-power developers and even a vegan soccer team.</p>